AAAS 4: SurveillanceThe Good, The Bad And The Questionable

Oct 1, 2009

Radio tags and West Nile Virus represent two different sides of an issue that, in today's world, has become increasingly difficult to ignore: constant surveillance. Separate sessions at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) meeting this weekend addressed why this practice is something to be both wary of and doggedly performed.

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"People know where you live, dine and shop," says Daniel Sui, a geographer with Texas A&M. "Location information has become a commodity." EZ-Pass and customer loyalty cards were only the beginning of a booming business in devices that pinpoint an individual's location in numerous ways. Medical bracelets and vehicle GPS units typically transmit coordinates with the users' knowledge, while spotlight surveillance cameras, cellphones and laptops do so surreptitiously.

Technology is now moving toward implants of radio chips at the behest of employers, says William Herbert, a lawyer with the Civil Service Employees Association, and there are no laws in place to regulate whether that can be required. "This country is not having a serious debate as to how to protect privacy in the light of new technology," he told a roomful of journalists at the conference today. "We're relying on a deregulated marketplace, and there's going to be an overexpansion of surveillance that's just not justified."

A panel of medical professionals, in contrast, trumpeted surveillance as a crucial means to prevent the spread of emerging infectious disease. "The way in which we interact with the world is changing, and in a way that's good for pathogens," says Mark Woolhouse, an epidemiologist at the University of Edinburgh. Phenomena like the intensification of farming livestock, global travel and trade, and greater diversity of domestic pets have grown the number of pathogen species to more than 1400. Three-quarters of those are zoonotic, or come from animals, and evolve very quickly to adapt to a new host.

West Nile virus, for instance, has infected 49 species of mosquitoes, 30 different animals and more than 130 species of birds. It has also infected more than a million people since it first came to the United States in 1999. While West Nile's variety of hosts is unusual, the virus is typical in that it was difficult for epidemiologists to anticipate how it would spread. "Most pathogens do not begin at home. We need to know what's going on in the regions where deforestation is happening, and where humans are coming into contact with new vectors," says Woolhouse. In short, much better surveillance.—J. Bogo

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